New Mexico Road Trip - Ruidoso Day 1

Sunday, October 27, 2024

Our goal for our first day in Ruidoso is to drive to White Sands National Park passing through two other scenic drives from our list to get there.  Surprisingly, as we were pretty tired last night, we were up and on the road just after nine.

Our plan today was to drive to White Sands National Park (Scenic Byway 24) on Scenic Byways 27 and 27, but we had time to do Scenic Byway 26 as a bonus.

The first scenic byway was #27, that started just outside of Ruidoso off US-70 (not to be confused with I-70) and followed NM-244 down to the town of Cloudcroft.  There is a faster way to get to Cloudcroft, but this was the backroad version, and it was very scenic.  We reached Cloudcroft and it was still pretty early so we decided to take a side trip from Cloudcroft up to a place called Sunspot that is Scenic Byway #26.  It is only a 17 miles drive, but it was slow going as the road had quite a few twists and bends to reach the 9200 feet altitude at Sunspot.

Scenic Byway 27

 

We enter Cloudcroft.

Before we started our side trip, we had to get gas and decided to get some sandwiches for lunch as we saw a sandwich shop near the gas station.  Unfortunately, it hadn’t opened yet, but when a woman inside saw us at the door she said to come in and they’d make some sandwiches for us.  She was very nice, and we were very grateful.  We got our sandwiches, something to drink and a very large chocolate chip cookie and started the drive up to Sunspot, the home of the Sunspot Solar Observatory.  It was built in 1950 and at their peak of activity there were three telescopes in operation, but now there is only one.  Here is a link to some more detailed information on Sunspot, it is very interesting.

It was a beautiful day with blue skies and temperatures in the low seventies even at the higher altitudes.  The drive up was very beautiful, but we weren’t really expecting much at the top as we thought the observatory would be closed off, but we were wrong and had a wonderful visit.

We arrive at the entrance to the Sunspot Solar Observatory

There was a gift shop / museum at the top where we talked to two very nice and very friendly women.  They filled us in on the history of the observatory and even set up a telescope outside where we could look at the sun.  It was a small telescope, but you could actually see the solar flares erupting around the edges and some sunspots on the surface, we had never seen anything like it.

There is a very nice museum and gift shop.

We found that they do offer guided tours of the observatory, but not on weekends so we were out of luck since it was Sunday.  There was a walkway around the facility for a self guided tour with information signs posted at the buildings.  The walk was very interesting, and we learned a lot, but at 9200 feet it was pretty easy to get out of breath.

This is the Richard B. Dunn Solar Telescope that is 134 feet tall and extends another 200 feet underground.  It was built in 1969 and is the only telescope in operation now.

This is the John W. Evans Solar Facility that housed to solar telescopes.  It was in operation from 1952 to 2015.

This is the Hilltop Dome that housed several telescopes.  It was used from 1963 to 2014.

This is the original solar telescope called the Grain Bin Dome as it was built in 1951 from a grain silo ordered from Sears & Roebuck.  It was in operation until 1963.

There were great views from Sunspot.  Most of the area in the distance is part of the huge White Sands Missile Range.  White Sands National Park is a small part of the area.

We didn’t expect much more from this Sunspot byway than a scenic drive, but it turned out to be a great stop and we were reluctant to leave, but we had other place to go today, so we headed back down to Cloudcroft.

We were getting hungry, so before we got all the way back to Cloudcroft, we found a side road and a place to stop and eat our lunch.  The sandwiches we got from the Cloudcroft sandwich shop were very good, so we had an excellent lunch.

We found a nice spot for lunch on a side road on our way back to Cloudcroft.

From Cloudcroft we started our third scenic byway of the day, US-82 between Cloudcroft and Alamogordo, Scenic Byway #25.  Val thought she remembered something about Alamogordo having something to do with the development of the first atomic bomb and after looking it up, sure enough, she was right, it was the monitoring point of the testing of the first atomic bomb, I had no idea.

As always, the drive was beautiful, and we dropped from the 8700-foot altitude pf Cloudcroft down to around 5000.  The scenic drive ended in Alamogordo and the scenery was anything but beautiful after that until we got to White Sands National Park.  We rejoined US-70 and it was a four-lane highway, and the outskirts of the town was littered with industrial and deserted buildings along the road.  After that the road went through some pretty desolate countryside on its way to El Paso, Texas and Las Cruces, New Mexico.

This area is also home to the huge White Sands Missile Range that covers 3200 square miles with an additional 4100 square miles of additional restricted space set aside that goes all the way south to the Mexican border.  There are also several military bases in this area including Holloman Air Force Base.  It is a highly restricted area and access is very limited, if you look at a map of the south-central area of New Mexico you’ll see a huge empty space with very few roads and no towns.  This area is bigger that the state of New Jersey.

As we drove west toward White Sand National Park, the altitude continued to drop reaching a low of 4000 feet; that’s the closest we’ve been to sea level since our stop in Laughlin.  We finally reached White Sands National Park and after a stop at the Visitor’s Center, we drove into the park.  At first, we felt a little disappointed, but as we got further into the dunes our disappointment turned to amazement.  It was a stark desolate landscape stretching as far as the eye could see.  There is no restriction on people being in the sand dunes so there were a lot of people hiking and sliding down the dunes.  We drove the loop road (the only road in the park) through the park taking pictures along the way and I had my GoPro mounted on the 4Runner taking videos the whole way.  This was Scenic Byway #24, our fourth scenic byway of the day.

Although interesting, we weren't exactly blown away as we entered the park, but ...

 

that soon changed as we got into the dunes, it was amazing.

We drove into one of the parking areas and noticed a few Indian women in their colorful saris in the dunes and stopped to take some pictures.

It was a little after three, so we were beginning to see the shadows and textures of the dunes that were very photogenic.  We could see why all the photo guides we read suggested going near sunrise or sunset, but on this trip that wasn’t possible for us.  The sand was also quite different than the beach sand we are used to in Southern California.  It is a gypsum sand that is a fine grain that feels smooth and silky and surprisingly, it doesn't absorb heat so even in the hot summer months it doesn't burn your feet when you walk on it.

 

In White Sands the temperature was up in the mid-eighties but not really to uncomfortable, but it did feel good to be in the air-conditioned car between our stops.  As it got later in the afternoon, we decided to start back to Ruidoso.  Instead of the scenic route back, we took the fastest way that took us only a little over an hour.  There were scenic portions as we neared Ruidoso, but for the main part, it was four land highway.  We made one stop in the small town of Tularosa where Val found a roadside stand hopefully selling the type of chilis she was looking for.  She didn’t find what she was looking for, but did find some pinion nuts that are shockingly expensive because they are so hard to gather, but also very good so we bought some to take home with us.

It was time to head back to Ruidoso.

We got back the Inn of the Mountain Gods around 4:30 and after relaxing a bit we went to the casino for a while and then had some dinner and returned to our room for the night.

When we returned to the Inn of the Mountain Gods we saw a woman in her native attire and Val struck up a conversation with her and found that she was Miss 2024 Mescalaro Apache and was there for an event.

It was a very nice view from our room.

Because we did four of the scenic byways today, we only have one short drive to do tomorrow, so we can relax a bit, and I think Val may continue her search for chillis.  Today was a really wonderful day and we enjoyed everywhere we went.  The road trip is turning out to be one of our best and we’ll judge it when it’s over, but at this point Val and I both think it may be the very best we have ever done.

Scenic Drives Completed: 20 of 35

Scenic Drives Missed: 1